Dream Big
around two years ago
i was wandering aimlessly i struggled in
my academics
and i had a hard time understanding
where i belonged
i just could not figure out how i was
going to make an impact on my community
and i didn’t have big dreams about my
future
and that’s when i got the opportunity to
volunteer with an
organization where i got to work with
kids from immigrant and refugee families
to engage with the students and help
them immerse into the community
and through this experience i saw
inequity in education
for the very first time
in talking with the students i realized
that there was a considerable gap
in understanding educational
opportunities
for example the kids i was working with
had never had a parent go to college
so they did not think it was an option
for them either
and as i started engaging with more and
more students
i realized that this problem was
widespread across
all demographics and communities
after further research i learned that
this problem is called
the achievement gap according to the
center for education policy analysis
at stanford university this achievement
gap
draws attention to the significant
disparity in
academic performance among different
groups of students based explicitly
on racial ethnic and socioeconomic
background
it highlights the inadequacies of an
inequitable education system
that cannot provide equal opportunities
for all kids to thrive and succeed
and this gap is not due to inherent
differences in the student capability
instead it is due to the obstacles and
conditions
that some groups of students face during
their educational pursuit
for example for one in every five
students
in the united states who live in poverty
college
one of the clearest paths to a brighter
future is
all but attainable
i want all students to have the power to
dream of a better future
and i wanted to work towards equipping
them with the tools they needed to do so
it became my new dream to play a role in
making the world a more equitable place
so after discussing this issue with a
few close friends
i co-founded the youth executive
leadership program
an international non-profit organization
focused on helping underrepresented
students learn vocational skills
and fight against education and equity
we started with a dream
of helping even just one kid and nearly
two years later
we have helped over a thousand kids from
all over the world
we wanted to inspire kids to achieve
their dreams by teaching them leadership
and public speaking skills
and mentoring them individually
so we started off with mentorship
workshops where he brought in
high profile leaders to share their
experiences
over this past year we have worked with
non-profits and organizations all over
the world
including the houston independent school
district
we have created mentorship programs in
countries such as uganda
and digital curriculums for girls in
rural india and china
we have raised over three thousand
dollars
for girls education in india which will
go towards sending 16 girls to school
this year
i have had the unique opportunity
to work with the most brilliant students
with the most diverse
backgrounds and get to watch them grow
into
confident kids ready to be leaders and
dreamers in the world
when i am conducting my workshops or
programs
i feel that empowering other students
has given me a vital purpose that i
could not find before
and suddenly i did not feel lost anymore
after starting this organization i
improved drastically in my academics
and i became more focused and motivated
to make a change in my community
suddenly i felt unchained in the sense
that i started believing in myself
and i saw the world from a different
lens
a lens in which anything is possible
as a high school student managing a
non-profit is a big responsibility
my co-founder and i have spent hundreds
of hours into creating curriculums
conducting our programs and working with
other nonprofits
from the very creation of this nonprofit
i have been so
passionate about this even though it is
a lot of hard work
and sleepless nights it didn’t take away
from the fact that when i woke
up every single day i knew that this is
precisely what i wanted to do
and that i loved doing it i
am a dreamer and every single one of you
should be too
so what is a dream
a dream is something that inspires you
to bring an idea that only you have
into this world to a dreamer the word
impossible
doesn’t exist because everything is
possible to them
dreamers don’t just envision things they
put them into action
they get out of their comfort zone and
push
the boundaries and they don’t dismiss
even the wildest of dreams
and these qualities of hard work
persistence
and the relentless pursuit of dreams are
what set apart
dreamers from the regular crowd
there is a four-step process to being a
dreamer
step one visualize your goals and dreams
write them out and stick them on your
wall or create a dream board to remind
you what you are working towards
every single day studies show
that when you visualize your dreams you
are more likely to achieve them
step two take action
dreamers don’t just get opportunities
handed to them
they create their own opportunities and
paths
you’ve got to stop procrastinating and
immerse yourself into your dreams
step 3 seek out inspiration from those
who have succeeded
although your ideas may be very unique
it is always beneficial to talk to
people who have done similar things
and learn from their mistakes and
experiences
and lastly step four
take feedback the right way no matter
how amazing or advanced you may be
there is always room for improvement
the only way to improve for the future
is to work on your past mistakes
a quick disclaimer bringing dreams to
life is not
impossible but it will take an immense
amount of hard work and dedication
you will have to make sacrifices and you
will have to get uncomfortable
but don’t let that stop you the number
one reason
why people don’t chase after their
dreams is due to fear
fear failure or fear of rejection
there will always be a million and one
reasons to not chase after your dreams
and it is easy to succumb to that fear
failure is an essential key to success
because it teaches you things that
success never can
for example one of our projects as a
part of the organization
is the audio video curriculum when my
team and i
had created our audio video curriculum
we had spent
countless hours working with specialists
and professors
filming our videos and designing our
worksheets
but when we pitched it to nonprofits
every single one rejected our curriculum
it felt like a kick to the gut because
of all of the hard work that had went
into this project
however we reached back out to these
non-profits and asked them
what went wrong and what we could do to
improve and they shared with us that our
curriculum
didn’t fit the cultural expectations of
the girls
girls in the specific region were
expected to remain obedient to their
families
and get married at earlier ages we
needed to take this
aspect of the culture into consideration
and adapt our curriculum
to better fit the needs of our audience
and
after we made these changes the very
first non-profit that we pitched to
took us up on our offer and we learned a
valuable lesson
to always take cultural expectations
into consideration
when working internationally
don’t be afraid to fail big
the important thing is to fail forward
learn and grow from those failures
as eleanor roosevelt once said
the future belongs to those who believe
in the beauty of their dreams
if you are in the same spot that i was
in two years ago
just know that there’s always a light at
the end of the tunnel
so dream big believe in your dream and
pursue your dream relentlessly
i am on a journey to empower other
students to dream
my story as a dreamer is just beginning
and i have so much left to do
i want to challenge each one of you here
today
to ask yourself what am i doing today
that will help me achieve my dreams